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Help choosing a Rehab facility in NorCal?

Hello all. I am hoping to find some info and or advice as to which facility would be best for my FIL. He was injured while riding (or crashing I guess I should say) a quad on Father's Day (6-18-17) with my husband and son. He was airlifted to a trauma hospital and has been there since but will be transferred to rehab soon. I am trying to help my MIL gather info and compare the facilities that are being offered to him for care and rehab. I'm not sure of the official name for his injury (MIL will be getting that to me today) but it's in his neck and he has only minor sensations down to his nipples but can *sometimes* wiggle a toe or 2 if he works very hard at it. He has not been on a respirator and has no broken or injured bones or other injuries, amazingly. He is almost 53 years old and was in perfect health and very active before his this.

Right now, we are being offered 3 places for rehab. Santa Clara, Sutter Rehab in Roseville, and Health South in Bakersfield. Roseville is closest, with Santa Clara a close 2nd. Health South is about 5hrs away. I've been most impressed with Santa Clara just from what I've read online but I have no idea what I'm doing and would value anyone's input. MIL is meeting with reps from each facility today and they will make their choice but she has asked me to look into each further. Thank you!!

Santa Clara Valley would be my 1st choice, with Sutter being the next. They are both CARF accredited as a Spinal Cord System of Care, while the HealthSouth facility in Bakersfield is not CARF accredited for any of its rehabilitation programs. In addition, Santa Clara Valley is a teaching hospital (affiliated with Stanford) and is a former SCI Model Systems Center.

Is your FIL by any chance a US military Veteran? If so, then I would strongly recommend the SCI program at the Palo Alto VAMC.

Thank you both for your replies! There is a chance FIL may need surgery before transfer but MIL is fighting this as she doesn't like/trust the dr and has little trust in the medical community itself. I hope they can find a dr they both like and trust at the new facility.

You can always appeal to the insurance company regarding the specialized therapy that is needed for spinal cord injury. Likely you will need letters of medical necessity, possibly written by his primary care doctor and doctors who have attended your father in law during this acute trauma stage of his care.

I've attached a short tutorial written by the American Spinal Injury Association that may help you understand the components of a comprehensive team approach to spinal cord injury rehabilitation. Familiarizing yourself with this kind of information may help in communicating with the insurance company and evaluating programs from which you may have to choose.

Thank you much. She is contacting the rep from SCVMC today because the case worker dropped the ball with calling insurance and now they have told her to call herself because they're too busy. Now they are pressuring them to make a choice of facilities and neither of these choices are acceptable to us! They've had almost no help from their social worker and case worker. Both have been very healthy and don't even see a dr regularly, which in this situation, is not helpful.